See You on the Flipside: Overtime
by Rollerwings
Summary: Back on the job after a hellish night shift he can't fully remember, Eggs Benedict rescues his one remaining coworker from his twisted father's control. The two friends soon find themselves at the mercy of malicious forces stalking their every move.
1. Eggs Benedict

**Rating: T** for graphic violence and gore, perilous situations, psychological trauma, mild swearing and mild sensuality

 **Setting:** 1983, Circus Baby's Entertainment and Rentals, immediately after the events of the game

 **Summary:** Back on the job after a hellish night shift he can't fully remember, Eggs Benedict rescues his one remaining coworker from his twisted father's control. The two friends soon find themselves at the mercy of malicious forces stalking their every move.

 **Author's Note:** _Five Nights at Freddy's: Sister Location_ and all canon characters, settings, etc. are the property of Scott Cawthon. This is a non-commercial fan tribute and was not written for profit.

Some lines of dialogue from the game were used; these are also the property of Scott Cawthon.

You are free to use any original concepts, headcanons and characters from this fanfiction in your own work (fanfiction, art, etc.) if you'd like.

Views expressed in this fanfiction do not necessarily match the writer's.

* * *

"Can't anything go my way for _once?"_ Eggs Benedict snarled, leaning with his forehead pressed against the cool glass panel of the vending machine. Alone as always in the lobby of his workplace, he stared down despondently at the cabinet. Behind the smudged glass, the noodles and chicken broth that were to have been his makeshift dinner gurgled down the drain where they had been dispensed, moments _before_ the foam cup had dropped into place. He had only fed the quarters into the machine out of habit anyway, as he had yet to feel any true pangs of hunger.

Still bemoaning his lost meal, the young man peered back at his own reflection, his face inches from the glass. His deep sigh produced two mere wisps of condensation on the panel, one below each nostril, which struck him as vaguely strange. From under the wayward locks of hair he had teased into his favored punkish style, two eyes, glistening with their usual earnest blue, gazed back at him.

 _Blue. Right, they'd always been blue, hadn't they?_ he shakily tried to reassure himself. _Whatever_ he had seen looking back at him in the hazy reflection of his bathroom mirror that morning was now as foggy as the air in the small tiled room itself had been.

"Hello. Hello?" The voice from down the hallway interrupted his thoughts. Familiar in the midst of a confusing night when all around him felt anything but ordinary, Clyde's tone was a soothing balm to Eggs's jangled nerves, and despite himself, he found a smile creasing his face.

Landing a retaliatory kick against the vending machine with his leather boot, the technician found his coworker in the spartan room that served as the company office for Circus Baby's Entertainment and Rentals. Clyde raised a hand in silent but enthusiastic greeting as he listened intently to the phone receiver clutched between his chin and shoulder, all while he rustled through the coffee-stained folders scattered over the surface of the desk.

Eggs smiled warmly, though he was concerned to see his usually stoic friend visibly upset. Perennially clad in button-down work shirts and wire-framed eyeglasses, Clyde presented quite a contrast to Eggs's devil-may-care style, which consisted of shredded clothing embedded with studs and spikes, the more the better. Visitors to the rental outfit's office frequently mistook the businesslike young man for someone in a much higher position, while _nobody_ would have guessed that Eggs, with his jokester personality and far more casual work ethic, was actually the eldest son of the company owner and stood to inherit the enterprise someday. Yet despite their differences, Clyde was the only one among the skeleton work crew at his father's business that Eggs could not only tolerate but actually like.

"I'm sorry to inform you at such late notice, but Circus Baby is no longer available to entertain at your church festival this weekend," Clyde said, resting a hand on his furrowed brow as a distressed squawk echoed over the line. "What? Uh, there's been some technical difficulty and she's, uh, out of service until further notice. Funtime Freddy? Nah, I'm afraid he's also out of commission."

 _Funtime Freddy has already been here today. Circus Baby has already been here today._ Eggs shook his head, trying to remember how it could be that he had already known about the loss of the animatronics.

His agitation growing as he tried to placate the indignant customer, Clyde twisted the phone cord around his fingers and looked up pleadingly at his friend and coworker, who could only shrug at the inexplicable situation that he had walked into.

"Okay, Eggs my man, what gives?" he demanded after he had finally ended the call, giving an exaggerated shrug in a gesture of surrender. "Just between you and me, I always thought your old man was a little off, but would you believe it, he sent the entire cast - _all of them!_ \- to the scooper last night, I guess after your shift." Clyde's winged hair swayed as he shook his head over the senseless destruction. "I went down there to see the aftermath for myself, and they're all goners. Guess that's gonna put us out of a job, huh?"

"Wow," muttered Eggs, his mind frantically scrambling to recall exactly what had gone down during his shift the night before. There remained gaps of time he could not account for, but he _did_ remember gazing down in stunned silence at the sight of the ruined animatronics, the remnants of their steel and fiberglass shells scattered across the floor like the carapaces of so many dead insects. The scooper itself, a brutal instrument resembling a miniature backhoe, had been tucked back in its idle position, poised above the fearsome aftermath of its work, and Eggs had stood transfixed before it for what had seemed an eternity. _What the hell happened to them last night? What happened to_ me?

"He...didn't clue me in ahead of time that he was going to do something _that_ drastic, since I already know that's going to be your next question," the technician began, feeling it was best to conceal the fact that he had arrived to his previous shift to find the animatronics already destroyed. "You've known the guy almost as long as I have," he added, cracking a forced smile. "Though even for him, this was a rather extreme way to tell us he's had it with the business and we're all fired."

"That's the thing, though," Clyde said, gesturing to the folders spread across his desk. "William may have made the terrible business decision to destroy our entire inventory, but believe it or not, he's keeping us on, and I'm supposed to stall the customers on the phone. Guess he's got some sort of plan to give 'em what they want."

"Sure he does!" Eggs assured his friend. His black leather jacket, dripping with a few select lengths of chain, crunched as he made himself comfortable on the desktop, earning a vaguely disapproving look from Clyde. "It turns out, animatronics were a short-lived fad, and what kids really want at their birthday parties are good old-fashioned clowns performing tricks. What do you say? You and I could get some greasepaint and ruffled collars, maybe do some juggling, throw a few pies..." Brandishing an imaginary pie-pan, he rushed his hand at Clyde's face, amused by his mortified expression.

"Not on your life!" Clyde yelped, seizing his friend's arm by the wrist. "I shouldn't speak ill of the dead and disassembled, but I was never a huge fan of our own resident clown, Circus Baby, or any others for that matter." Reddening, he admitted, "let's just say some joker at the circus years ago singled me out of the audience for some mistreatment with his seltzer bottle and leave it at that." He smirked at the memory, while Eggs doubled over in laughter, nearly sliding off the desk.

"Sorry to make you relive such trauma, mate!" he quipped. "Okay, so no clowns, but maybe we can still salvage the family business despite my father's apparent efforts to run it into the ground. I feel bad for letting that church group down, so let's send over our bouncy castle and dunk tank for their festival, and we'll throw in the sno-cone and cotton candy machines. Along with our sincere condolences for not being able to provide the requested entertainment, I'd also say a half-off discount is in order." His eyes fell to Clyde's hand, which was still gripping his wrist.

"Curse it, what have you been _into?"_ Eggs asked, noticing for the first time the dried and crusted red material under his friend's fingernails. The receptionist quickly withdrew his hand, studying it dumbfoundedly.

"Hydraulic fluid, no doubt," Clyde answered flatly as though he was trying to convince himself as much as Eggs. "You know the drill, it's just part of the 'endless janitorial opportunities' that come with this line of work. There wasn't much else to do earlier, so Old Man Ass-Ton called up and asked me to muck out the scooping room after he'd used it for his own private demolition derby. It fell on my shoulders because Derrick and Marv haven't shown up for two days now." He shuddered in distaste at the memory of peeling off the drenched and slimy company-issued jumpsuit after the task was done, of frantically washing his hair in the maintenance room washtub. In his state of extreme sleep deprivation he blessedly couldn't remember the rest, although he was certain it had to have been beyond unpleasant.

Letting out a guffaw at Clyde's uncharacteristically irreverent nickname for his father, Eggs was left wondering if the stress of the job had left him unguarded enough to utter it aloud. Although Clyde could be irritatingly deferential to his boss and often gave the appearance of being the quintessential "yes-man," when only Eggs was around he tended to loosen up, voicing his vague disapproval of some of the company's more dubious practices.

"So Derrick and Marv bailed on us, huh? No great loss there, but now that things are slow anyway, howsabout we pick apart last night's episode of _The Immortal and the Restless?_ You know you're the only guy besides me who'll admit to watching that schlock, so 'fess up! Did you honestly see _that_ one coming? Vlad and Clara got back together, just because he bought his rugrat a fast-food meal?"

"Nope," admitted Clyde, leaning back in his chair and lacing his fingers behind his head. He and Eggs were both unabashed fans of the campy, late-night vampire soap opera. "Vlad slays me, though. He only thought of that _after_ Clara burned down the house and left him. Think they'll actually stay together?"

"I'm sure they'll keep up their love affair for at least another season, just for the ratings." Eggs chuckled, remembering the over-the-top scenarios the lead characters had found themselves in over the course of recent episodes. "But really, Vlad's a class-A jerk for rejecting his own kid."

Keenly aware they were no longer talking about television drama, Clyde felt a lump form in his throat.

"I-I'm really sorry your dad doesn't care much for you," he blurted out before briefly falling into an uncomfortable silence. "You stuck by him through it all, and you're a great guy." _You don't deserve that._

Eggs turned sharply away, feeling something twist in his stomach as he did so. As much as he had tried to suppress the pain from his father's brutal coldness, at times like now it still stung.

"'S'okay," he muttered. "I mean, thanks. That means a lot, coming from you." At a loss for words, he leaned across the desk, folding his arms around his startled coworker and clutching him to his chest. "But hey, if we two chumps are the only ones still aboard this sinking ship, at least we should stick together, right?" He released him after hearing a muffled reply from somewhere under the tangle of leather-clad arms, and Clyde wriggled free, blushing fiercely while rubbing his forearms as if warding off a shudder.

"As nice as that was, you're as cold as ice! And I didn't want to bring it up, but you're looking a little peaked as well, not that I should talk," said Clyde with some concern, staring down at his own pale arms. Though it was the start of what was shaping up to be a sun-drenched summer, neither man's work schedule allowed for much time lazing around outdoors.

"I'm just trying to look more like your hero Vlad, dark ruler of the night," hissed Eggs jestingly, holding an imaginary cape before his face as his impersonation of the vampire soap opera lead earned a chuckle from Clyde. _"I vant to scoop your blood!"_

"You're a riot, but take it from me: the night shift can be a killer. The swing shifts and total lack of daylight down here will really throw you off, and I never could have hacked it myself if it hadn't been for your dad."

Eggs allowed Clyde to drone on, unheeded, about how William was admittedly a brilliant nutritional expert who could prescribe the optimal vitamin formula for any night-shift worker to maximize his productivity, and a lot of other mumbo-jumbo that sounded as though it had been absorbed and then parroted back without much thought on Clyde's part. Afton did have a persuasive, even seductive personality that Clyde was hardly immune to.

"Wait, he's giving you daily _shots?"_ Eggs croaked in disbelief, suddenly listening raptly.

"You betcha." Clyde prodded his bicep with a finger. "Myself and all the other long-time night owls, and now that you're starting your second week you oughtta see him so he can hook you up with what you need. There's Vitamin D to combat the darkness, melatonin to fight mood alterations and even some compounds to boost energy levels so working a double shift's no big deal anymore. I guess it's better than nothing, since the Afton Robotics health plan leaves a bit to be desired."

Eggs's hand reached up instinctively to his arm, running over flesh that felt tender even under the thick leather of his jacket sleeve, and his eyes narrowed in suspicion.

 _No wonder everything last night was such a blur!_ For the second time, he felt an uncomfortable twisting sensation, deep in his gut.

"I'm heading down to the scooping room," he announced, no longer sure he could trust even his closest friend. "You wanna come with? There's something weird going on here, or my name's not Eggs Benedict."

 _"It's not,"_ Clyde countered under his breath, making a snap decision to join him in the service elevator. He shuddered at the sight of the deep shaft they were about to descend, visible through the metal grid below their work boots. "I never could figure out how you could drop into this hellhole every night like it was nothing...Mike."


	2. Cheese Fondue and Mushrooms

"I _heard_ that," Eggs warned, startling Clyde. "I dunno, Mike's actually an okay name, and I might've even chosen it if I could've named myself way back when I was a little ankle-biter. But _he_ picked it," the technician said, his face drawing into a pinched scowl and leaving no doubt as to whom he was referring, "so when I finally came to my senses I had no problem following the old punk rock tradition of taking on a new name, however irrelevant. Anything to distance myself from him." He felt it best not to bring up the fact that he was, out of desperation, under the employ of the very father he had sought to disown.

"Gotta admit, 'Eggs Benedict' is about the punkest nickname a guy could ask for," Clyde nodded in agreement, while studying his friend's face in profile. The strong jawline, the slight cleft in his chin and the steely blue eyes left no question as to his heritage. Eggs was undoubtedly his father's son, and yet he had forged his own identity so distinct it helped discredit the physical similarities. The senior Afton's eyes were perpetually shooting invisible daggers at his hired underlings for some perceived incompetence, while fine creases had prematurely set in around Eggs's eyes and mouth from his habit of taking on every challenge with a smile, or at least a sneer depending on what the situation called for. It seemingly pained William to so much as acknowledge hard work with a stiff handshake; Eggs was infamous for catching his friends off guard with spontaneous embraces. Sometimes Clyde was left wondering if his boss had ever possessed the slightest hint of the genuineness that his son exemplified, and if so, what had happened to force him to abandon it.

"Eggs Benedict," piped up an authoritative voice from somewhere around the technician's waist, causing him to instinctively fumble for the device he had tucked through his belt loop. "A traditional American brunch dish of debated origin, consisting of a poached egg, ham or bacon, an English muffin and hollandaise sauce. Typically high in caloric content-"

"And _not_ typically found among the most popular baby names of the Eighties," Eggs interjected, gazing down at the screen of his company-issued data pad. The "HandUnit," as their coworker Marv had affectionately dubbed it, resembled a child's plaything with its bright orange frame, complete with a set of cartoonish eyes overlooking a monochrome display screen. Though his father had invested no small amount into the development of the cutting-edge computers for his workers' in-house communication, the devices were still limited by the technology of the time and their touch-screens were wildly inaccurate.

"Still don't know how you got that one out of 'Mike,' but I'll take it," Eggs said with his trademark grin, squeezing the grip on the data pad slightly before replacing it in his belt loop. On his first night of work a fortnight ago, he had tried to type his given name into his HandUnit, only to have the device assign him the ridiculous nickname he had immediately and inexplicably fallen in love with.

With a lurch, the freight elevator began its rapid descent, sending both men instinctively reaching backward for hand rails that weren't there. The large fan mounted in the ceiling sliced the air with its wide blades and cast an array of disorienting shadows across the confined space. In the gloom, Eggs's pale flesh appeared even more wan, his ever-present smile somehow taking on a darker quality, while behind him, a poster depicting one of the rental characters flapped against the rushing air.

"Then again, it could be worse," Clyde conceded in an effort to be jovial, holding forth his own HandUnit for Eggs's inspection through squinted eyes. "Just lookit. I must've killed a good half-hour trying to hunt-and-peck my name into this gizmo before it finally took over and dubbed me 'Cheese Fondue.'" He rolled his eyes, while Eggs began to double over in laughter at the sight of the ridiculous nickname before thinking better of it and abruptly straightening, smoothing a hand down his shirtfront with some concern. "Y'know, the melted crud everybody and his brother served with the little bread cubes at trendy parties a few years back?"

"Human input error and typing inefficiency are factors beyond my control," replied the device curtly, and when Eggs seized it from Clyde's grip he could have sworn he heard an electronic squeak of surprise from the HandUnit's speaker. He had not put it past his father to have somehow instilled an element of his own biting sarcasm and cruelty into the extensive artificial intelligence that ran the company's fleet of HandUnits, as the devices had a way of putting down their users with frequent and thinly-veiled jabs.

"Wait, are you insinuating my pal here is a lousy typist when that's one of his main job duties?" the technician asked with an exaggerated snarl. "I got news for you, then, _Handy._ The boss has abandoned this place, and what _we_ say goes now, so I'll thank you to cool it with the insults."

"I...actually eked by with a 'C' in typing," Clyde admitted with a meek shrug, reaching for the expensive device that had been entrusted to his care while Eggs stubbornly held it at arm's length. "Maybe my HandUnit's right. I've always been fine with the letters, but those numbers and shift-key symbols on the top row still throw me for a loop." He bit his lower lip when Eggs put up a hand to silence him and jab an index finger at the screen.

"...So as I was saying, we're both done taking orders and sass from a glorified Speak'N'Spell," Eggs continued now that he was on a roll. "Any more lip from you and maybe we'll see how a HandUnit fares against the Scooper. I bet _that_ wouldn't work out so well."

 _"Don't!"_ Clyde exclaimed pleadingly, snatching the HandUnit from his friend's grip and hugging it protectively against his chest before he realized what he was doing and tried to save face. "It's just that on a practical level, these Handies might be our only link to your dad if he's not coming back anytime soon, and besides, I've witnessed the aftermath of enough destruction for one day."

 _I want to believe you're not becoming your father, but when you pull stuff like that, how can anyone tell for certain?_ Clyde wanted to ask, as Eggs abruptly backed away until he was partially concealed in the shadows, no doubt mulling over his unwarranted threats that had only been half-mocking in nature and had caught them both off guard.

"Look at me," Eggs sighed, brooding in the darkness where he had retreated in an unguarded moment of reflection. "Reduced to intimidating a talking calculator. Most days I swear I'm no better than _him._ At least I checked myself before I went on a robot-wrecking rampage, though, right?"

"You're a hell of a lot better than 'him,' Eggs, and don't you forget it," Clyde stammered. "I meant what I said up there. You're a great guy." Eggs - _Mike,_ he reminded himself - was more than great. Having spent enough time in William Afton's employ, Clyde had discerned most of Eggs's sad story from hints dropped in conversation and blatantly disparaging remarks from his boss, and he marveled that his friend could have emerged from it as kindly and good-natured as he was.

The product of an illicit affair, Eggs had never been fully acknowledged by his cold and distant father, who had shut out his former partner as surely as the child they had created together. Raised by his dedicated mother who had afforded him a serene childhood far away from his father's harmful chaos, Eggs had attempted to reach out to William again when he was in his late teens. By that time, the senior Afton had already entered and left a shaky marriage, and Eggs had been overjoyed to learn he had a trio of half-siblings.

"Y'know, I've never said this before, but you're ten times the father William ever was to those three, and they're never gonna forget what you did for them, even if they may not appreciate it now," Clyde said, grateful the darkness hid the flush spreading across his face.

"Yeah," Eggs replied, a rare hint of self-pity creeping into his voice. "I tried to convince myself he finally welcomed me into the family, but even that was done on the condition I'd help out after his wife left him high and dry with three kids and a business to manage. Not that I blame Rachel for splitting on him, considering his lovely personality and all."

 _You have a big heart, though,_ Clyde wanted to say. _You'd have stepped in for those kids regardless._

"Anyway, how perceptive of you to notice that not all of them appreciate my efforts," Eggs said, shrugging in exasperation. "Rusty's the best and I swear, he worships the ground I walk on, but he's an impressionable five-year-old kid who still has his imaginary friends and likes to pretend his dolls are alive. Then there's Rodney. Typical teenager, he makes it plain as day that he resents me intruding into his life, and I swear if he's not hanging out with that rough crowd of mates he has, he's dreaming up new ways to torment his brother. That's exactly what Rusty _doesn't_ need right now, right?"

"Rodney's hurting, too," Clyde said in a low voice. "When you lose someone close to you and you're only fifteen or so, part of you just breaks inside and there's no putting that back together." Swiftly shoving his hands in his pockets so he wouldn't be tempted to fumble for his wallet, he thought of the memento card tucked into the billfold's plastic sleeves alongside his employee identification and driver's license. It had been seven years, and he could no sooner stop carrying the prayer card from his friend's funeral than he could ever forget who Buddy had been and what their friendship had meant to him.

"To be honest, I've thought of what that must have been like for you whenever I'm trying to reason with Rodney, and don't worry, I haven't given up on him even if my father has," Eggs said, watching the muscles around Clyde's jaw tighten, suggesting he was gritting his teeth. Though their small town's only unsolved homicide had happened long before he had returned to town to reconcile with his father, in an unguarded moment Clyde had confessed to him that he had been best friends with the victim and his death had been the moment Clyde's carefree youth had been destroyed.

"I keep telling myself it's a cold case with no suspects, just a random killing behind the diner before your dad took it over, but I still think he was targeted. And yeah, Rodney's a tough call, and if he has it in for you then that's two of us he resents." Although he found the forced, tough-guy attitude Rodney tried to project nothing less than grating, Clyde could understand why Rodney no doubt felt usurped as the oldest child in his family, twice over. Not only had Eggs returned to reclaim his place among the Aftons, but William had increasingly begun using Clyde as a personal assistant, ordering him to babysit and chauffeur the trio, even tutor Rodney with his schoolwork. His new role hardly lent itself to much acceptance from the teenager, who sorely lacked the responsibility to involve himself in his siblings' care, let alone in his father's enterprise.

"Escapism." Eggs let the word hang for a moment before continuing. "That's why if Rod's not at the arcade, he's at home in the den, slouched in front of the Atari. I've been able to get a little out of him, and he blames himself for what happened to Becky."

"And here I thought blaming ourselves was supposed to be _our_ job. You and I were both in charge of that whole gaggle of kids at that 'test run' party, and we lost one. I still can't see how that happened on our watch." Clyde pulled his hands from his pockets and wrung them in despair. Not even the high doses of sleeping medication William had prescribed and administered had been effective at staving off the repeated nightmares, forever on a loop in his troubled dreams ever since the incident.

"You don't really still buy that, do you, man?" Eggs tolerated Clyde's unswerving devotion to his boss, but the receptionist sometimes took it to unhealthful extremes, believing the charismatic William without question even when logic and common sense practically demanded one to accept the man was lying. _If he told you the sky was green, you wouldn't raise an eyebrow, would you?_

"So maybe I do still 'buy it,' okay?" Clyde's tone was uncharacteristically irritable. "And y'know why? Because if I _don't_ believe that William's ex came in during that party and slipped out with Becky, I've got to believe something _far_ worse and I can't bring myself to do that. She and Rusty feel like my own kids, I've spent so much time around them. Rodney, too." The unusually stoic young man was helpless to calm the trembling in his balled fists that always crept in on the rare occasions he found himself deep in emotion. _Y'know something else?_ he wanted to ask aloud, but challenging Eggs when he had already shown volatility toward his HandUnit would have been unwise to say the least. _I swear, wherever she took Becky has got to be_ so _much better than where she left Rodney and Rusty and damn if I wish she hadn't taken them, too._

"My father still hasn't filed a report on her for parental kidnapping, and I wouldn't count on him doing so anytime soon," Eggs said, shrugging in frustration just as the elevator came to a gentle rest in the depths of the sprawling underground compound that made up Circus Baby's Entertainment and Rentals. Once the large fan mounted in the ceiling slowed its rotations, the posters ceased their wild flapping to a more subdued flutter, though neither man noticed. Both stood looking off to the side, deep in their own private worlds of hurt.

The technician winced from a sharp, grinding sensation deep in his gut, a sure sign of guilt. He pulled both hands over the ball cap he wore as part of his work uniform, wishing he could stretch the headgear to cover his entire face. _You didn't even_ listen _to what he just said!_

 _She and Rusty feel like my own kids..._

* * *

 _Two months earlier_

Emitting a terrible roar and pretending to swipe invisible claws at his kid brother with outstretched hands, Rodney leapt from the pantry the child had just opened, delighting at Rusty's horrified screams. Tugging back the mask depicting Foxy the Pirate, one of the characters their father had designed for his enterprise, over his jet-black hair, he had a full view of his brother backpedaling in wide-eyed shock across the kitchen floor, colliding against the cabinets so hard the bowl of cereal in his hands splashed across his t-shirt.

"Haha, gotcha, squirt!" taunted Rodney, seconds before William appeared in the doorway and clapped him across the back of the head so hard it dislodged his mask. Through watering eyes he regarded his glaring father, while from her place at the table Becky cowered at the chaos that had broken out at the family's breakfast table, biting her lower lip. Across the kitchen, Clyde and Eggs paused where they had been assembling brown-bag lunches for the children.

"You snot-nosed brat!" William huffed irritably, while Rodney rubbed the back of his head, wincing. "You just can't let a day go by without tormenting that kid, can you?" Grumbling aloud about the many transgressions Rodney had been guilty of lately, the senior Afton was shocked to find himself interrupted by his typically agreeable long-time assistant.

"Sir, can we maybe _not_ turn this into a free-for-all against the guy?" asked Clyde with a rare edge of confrontation in his voice from his spot on the linoleum floor where he'd knelt to help Rusty towel himself off. Since Clyde had never made it a secret that he resented Rodney's habitual mistreatment of his brother, the teen was surprised to witness their babysitter in the role of an ally.

"You should be damned glad you can't have kids of your own after mornings like these, Clyde," William griped, mouthing each revealing word through a twisted sneer. Rising stiffly from the table, he excused himself from the room that had fallen silent and set off on the short walk to his diner, where the day's work awaited.

In the awkward aftermath, Rodney swallowed hard, a bitter taste in his mouth, while Eggs put a hand on Clyde's shoulder and the younger duo looked on in bewilderment, aware that something of gravitas had been said but not of its exact implications.

 _"That_ was a real swell bomb to drop," Clyde finally sighed, crossing his arms over his chest. "Guess that's my own stupid fault for telling William that." Next to him, Eggs's jaw dropped.

"You really can't...?" Rodney asked in the most reverent tone he could muster, and Clyde scrambled for words, feeling he owed them some explanation.

"Y'know, I wish this scene wasn't all about me, but yeah, my chances are beyond hopeless. I pulled through a really bad childhood illness, but it all but destroyed my ability in that regard, or at least so my doctor warned me back then. So that's a tough break, but on the flip side at least I made it, right?" Under the brim of his ballcap, Clyde's face had reddened, while Eggs's concern for his friend grew.

 _Nothing's_ ever _fair._

* * *

"I know what you're thinking," Clyde said, breaking Eggs out of his reverie. _"That's_ why I can't get why your dad's been snowing us about what really happened to Becky. He has an amazing family and he couldn't care less about any of you. Ugh, but enough feeling sorry for myself. Here I am going on about what wasn't meant to be when _you're_ the guy who lost someone."

 _You and me both got a bad deal out of this,_ Eggs wanted to say aloud, instead dropping down on stiff joints to make the usual crawl through the long system of ventilation ductwork that led to the underground facility's main control module.

"I heard this place was once a mushroom farm," he informed Clyde instead, sniffing at the ever-present dampness of the corridors. "To save money on drilling, the natural caves were connected by these tunnels barely large enough to let a human crawl his way through." A slight echo reverberated off the metal walls around him, and he broke into a sardonic grin.

"And when you think about it, my father _still_ ran this place like a mushroom farm."

"How so?" asked Clyde, clambering along behind him.

"He kept us in the dark and always fed us more bullcrap, right?" Rewarded by a guffaw from his friend, Eggs's grin never faded. When all looked bleak, it at least felt good to laugh again, whether at a corny vampire soap opera or his own jokes.


End file.
